1998 Legislative Session: 3rd Session, 36th Parliament

HANSARD

The following electronic version is for informational purposes only.

The printed version remains the official version.

Official Report of

DEBATES OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY

(Hansard)

TUESDAY, APRIL 28, 1998

Afternoon

Volume 9, Number 4

[ Page 7269 ]

The House met at 2:04 p.m.

Hon. I. Waddell: In October the city of Victoria will host at the Royal B.C. Museum a world-class exhibition on Leonardo da Vinci. I hope that members will tell their constituents and their American friends to come to it. We have the honour today to put up the banners announcing that. Of course, I can't unfurl the banners here, but I can introduce to the House the president of the Victoria Business Improvement Association, Geoff Parkin, and his wife Gillian. Would the House please make them welcome.

Hon. G. Clark: It gives me great pleasure today to introduce a group of very special visitors to the House. In the members' gallery this afternoon is the advisory council for the Order of British Columbia. These men and women have gathered in Victoria today to review this year's nominations for the order and to select the recipients for the June investiture. I understand that there were 155 nominations, many of which were submitted by members of this chamber on both sides of the House. This year they were submitted as well from every corner of the province. The OBC Advisory Council is chaired by the Hon.

Allan McEachern, Chief Justice of the Court of Appeal of British Columbia. It includes our Speaker; Mayor Steve Wallace of Quesnel -- the president of the Union of B.C. Municipalities, who unfortunately can't attend today; Dr. Charles Jago, president of the University of Northern British Columbia; Mr. Chris Trumpy, Deputy Minister of Finance; and two current members of the order, Ms. Meg Hickling and Mr. Jake Kerr, both of Vancouver. I ask all members to make them welcome.

V. Anderson: I have six guests here today. They came over to have a visit with the Minister of Advanced Education. They are representatives from the Taiwanese Canadian Cultural Society, which has its office and its facilities in my riding. I'm delighted to be able to share this opportunity with them. There's Dr. Steve Wang, the chairperson of the society; Dr. Pang Chang and Dr. Shing Kuo Shih, the co-chairpersons of the building committee; Ms. Karen Shih, the vice-chairperson of the society; Mr. Victor Lo, the general secretary of the society; and Mr. Mike Yang, the coordinator of the society. I ask the House to make them all very welcome.

W. Hartley: Today in the gallery we have some 25 visitors with about 20 adults and their teacher, Ms. B. Golob, from the Life Christian School in Tacoma, Washington. They're here for comparative government and local history. Please welcome them.

Hon. D. Miller: Joining us today are four members of the Canadian Petroleum Products Institute. I want to introduce them, and I think my hon. colleague from Delta South wants to join in this. They are: Ford Ralph, the chair of CPPI and vice-president of Petro-Canada; Pat Yarrington, president of Chevron; Bill Levy, vice-president of CPPI; and Judy Wish, the executive director of CPPI.

F. Gingell: I would like to add to that group a young man in my life, William Duncan, who was articled to me as a CA student in the 1960s. I encouraged him to join Mohawk Oil. He is now the president and the chief executive officer of a company I follow with great interest. I ask the House to please join me in making Bill Duncan welcome.

G. Abbott: I'm very delighted today to welcome some constituents from the Shuswap. The Redding family is here from Salmon Arm. I had the opportunity to work with Marcie Redding for several years in the Shuswap economic development commission. She's here with her husband Gordon and daughter Allison. I'd like the House to make them welcome.

G. Wilson: It's perhaps appropriate on this day of mourning for workers killed on the job that I have four guests I'm honoured to introduce. They represent injured workers whose lives have been shattered. Would this House please welcome Brigit Lund, her son Steve Lund, Louise Roussen and Analees Roussen. They represent injured workers in British Columbia in their fight against the WCB.

M. Sihota: Here today to watch the proceedings and discuss issues relating to education are a number of parents from Glenlake School in the Western Communities. Would all members please join me in giving a warm welcome to Julie Paugh, Shelley Doroshyk and Rick Atkinson.

Hon. S. Hammell: I'd like to introduce Alidh Carpendale. She is a grade 11 student from University Hill in Vancouver. She is in the career and personal planning program and is participating in a job-shadow of my position as Minister of Women's Equality. Would the House please make her welcome.

Hon. D. Lovick: It's my pleasure today to introduce four guests. Mr. Brian Johnston and Ms. Phyllis Cullis are here from the Injured Workers of Victoria Association. As well, Mr. Bill Fowler, the secretary-treasurer of the Victoria Labour Council, is here. And I notice a friend from Nanaimo, Mr. Barry O'Neill, who also happens to be the president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, B.C. division. I would ask my colleagues to please join me in making these people welcome.

E. Walsh: I too would like to introduce to the House and acknowledge Barry O'Neill, who is the president of CUPE B.C. With him is Neil Bradbury, who is also with CUPE B.C. -- he is the legislative coordinator for CUPE. I'd also like to join my colleague from Esquimalt in welcoming Rick Atkinson. He is an advanced life support worker with the Ambulance Paramedics of B.C. here in Victoria, a sublocal of CUPE, Local 873. I would ask the House to join me in welcoming all three of my brothers to the House.

Hon. D. Zirnhelt: Two dedicated and competent members of my staff are here in the gallery: Denise Blackwell and Kimberley Free. Please welcome them.

Hon. P. Ramsey: I would like to join in welcoming, from CUPE, Neil Bradbury. He works with children in our schools. I ask the House to make Neil welcome.

T. Stevenson: I would also like to join in welcoming one particular member of the committee that the Premier welcomed. That's Ms. Meg Hickling, who is a member of the Order of B.C. I have known Ms. Hickling for many years, going back to my early university years. She is well known for her work in sex education in schools throughout B.C. I hope that the House will make her particularly welcome.

[ Page 7270 ]

Introduction of Bills

WORKERS COMPENSATION

(OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY)

AMENDMENT ACT, 1998

Hon. D. Lovick presented a message from His Honour the Lieutenant-Governor: a bill intituled Workers Compensation (Occupational Health and Safety) Amendment Act, 1998.

Hon. D. Lovick: I move that Bill 14, Workers Compensation (Occupational Health and Safety) Amendment Act, 1998, be introduced and read for a first time.

This act establishes the fundamental statutory framework necessary to promote and protect the health and safety of British Columbia workers. Far too many of our workers are becoming injured or are being killed on the job. In fact, three workers die from workplace injuries every week, 751 workers are injured every day, and 16 workers are permanently disabled every day. This is an unacceptable human tragedy, and we cannot to afford to let it continue. I think it's especially appropriate today, hon. Speaker, as we acknowledge this day of mourning for workers killed or injured on the job, that we introduce this legislation.

The introduction of the act is in direct response to the recommendations of the interim report of the Royal Commission on Workers Compensation in British Columbia. It is built upon the strengths of the existing prevention system administered by the Workers Compensation Board and is further strengthened by the advice and input from employers and from labour. This act sets out the general purposes of the new component on occupational health and safety and its relationship with

part 1 of the Workers Compensation Act, which focuses on compensation. It also sets out the Workers Compensation Board's mandate with respect to occupational health and safety and the occupational environment.

Further, the act sets out the general duties and obligations of employers, workers, supervisors, owners, suppliers, and directors and officers of a corporation to ensure that our workplaces are healthy and safe. The act specifies the requirement for joint health and safety committees in all workplaces with 20 or more workers and for worker health and safety representatives in all workplaces with ten to 19 workers. It defines the functions and duties of the committees and the health and safety representatives.

The Speaker: Hon. minister, time is up.

Hon. D. Lovick: I appreciate that this is a fairly large and complex bill, and I want to advise the House that my staff will be offering information briefings to the opposition members.

[2:15]

Bill 14 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

THE PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT

G. Plant presented a bill intituled The Parental Responsibility Act.

G. Plant: Every day the headlines remind us that youth crime is serious, persistent and seemingly intractable. Today we are told that amendments to the Young Offenders Act of Canada are forthcoming, and amendments are needed to that act. But that presents the question: what can we in this chamber do to help address the problem of youth crime, both in its causes and in its symptoms? I think there is a need for a wide range of creative responses to this problem, and The Parental Responsibility Act offers one such response.

The purpose of the act is to enhance the accountability and responsibility of parents for the actions of children who damage property -- actions which, if not in themselves criminal, all too frequently set the stage for criminal activity down the road. The act imposes civil liability on parents for damage to property caused by their children, up to a maximum of $5,000, if those parents failed to exercise reasonable supervision over their child or failed to make reasonable efforts to prevent and discourage the activity that led to the damage.

This act does not in any way purport to solve all of the problems of youth crime; it is but one small piece of a very large puzzle. But I think we do need to be creative and thoughtful if we are ever to make real progress in taking this puzzle apart. The Parental Responsibility Act would, if enacted by this House, make a positive contribution to this difficult issue.

I move that the bill be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill M205 introduced, read a first time and ordered to be placed on orders of the day for second reading at the next sitting of the House after today.

Oral Questions

MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND MINISTERIAL CONDUCT GUIDELINES

M. de Jong: It's been an informative couple of days. We've learned that we have a Premier's Office that is meeting with the head of the ALC to discuss a pending application. We know that we've got a Minister of Environment who's lobbying everyone, because by her own admission, her re-election depends on it. And we know that we have an Agriculture minister who is funding the production of reports to try and schmooze an application past the ALC.

The Speaker: Hon. member, your question.

M. de Jong: He's brokering; he's lobbying; he's applying an inordinate amount of pressure -- by the admission of the ALC commissioners. My question to the Minister of Agriculture is: has he even read the guidelines that Mr. McArthur produced in response to the activities of the member for Esquimalt-Metchosin? And if he has, why hasn't he followed them?

Hon. C. Evans: The Agricultural Land Commission is a bit of an anomaly in governance in that it has no appeal. You cannot appeal a decision from the Land Commission to the court or to government. The act actually says that if the government were to intervene at any point, the provincial interest needs to be defined before the Land Commission rules on a judgment. I find, therefore, that it's appropriate that I talk to the chair of the commission -- a lifetime civil servant, not a volunteer -- about those issues, because that's what the act directs me to do. It is my job.

The Speaker: I recognize the member for Matsqui on his first supplementary.

[ Page 7271 ]

M. de Jong: He's calling, he's phoning, he's applying pressure, but he's not trying to influence. Not this minister -- he wouldn't do something like that.

Let me help him. Let me read to him what Mr. McArthur said in his report:

"Ministers cannot and should not be expected to work in an environment where they can be found guilty of a career-threatening transgression, but for which there is confusion about what constitutes such a transgression. This situation must be corrected immediately by developing specific and unambiguous guidelines on this question, and it is my intention to do so on a priority basis."

I haven't seen those guidelines, but the minister must have seen them.

The Speaker: Through the Chair, hon. member.

M. de Jong: Will he stand in the House today and say that he read them, and will he table them in this chamber so that we can all share his confidence about having not violated the integrity of the ALC?

Hon. G. Clark: I rise to answer because the facts in the case that the member raises are completely different than the facts with respect to the Six Mile Ranch application. The reason I want to be clear about this . . . . As the minister said, the act gives the jurisdiction to the minister. The minister has an obligation to consider whether or not to move to a provincial interest test. It is only when there is an application before the commission and prior to hearings that the minister has to decide whether or not to move to provincial interests.

I remind the members opposite -- and I could go on at some length -- about that member's own comments during this whole period, demanding that the minister and cabinet declare a provincial interest. The minister has the jurisdiction to discuss this matter; the minister has in fact an obligation to raise this question. The minister has the legal requirement to declare whether or not this is in the provincial interest and cabinet should deal with it.

Because this

section of the act had not been used for some five years, it is clearly appropriate for the Minister of Agriculture to have pursued due diligence to ensure that the process, the definition and the application were such that we knew how to move forward to implement the provincial interest -- completely different than the facts referred to by the member.

The Speaker: The member for Matsqui on his second supplementary.

M. de Jong: Maybe the Premier didn't hear what the members of the Agricultural Land Commission said while he was down on Rodeo Drive. They said that this minister applied an inordinate amount of pressure. That wasn't due diligence; that was being contrary to what this government should be standing for, and that's the integrity of the ALC.

The Speaker: Hon. member, through the Chair, please.

M. de Jong: Hon. Speaker, maybe the Premier doesn't read his own reports. He got rid of the member for Esquimalt-Metchosin when Mr. McArthur said that a minister must not contact or make representations to a commissioner that is hearing a matter or might reasonably be expected to hear a matter. This matter was before the ALC; it was turned down. It was going back to the ALC. Will he apply the same standards and get rid of this Minister of Agriculture?

Hon. C. Evans: Hon. Speaker, while we are reading papers, allow me to quietly read a paper written by Kirk Miller, precisely during the period that the hon. member accuses me of leaning on the guy. He says:

" . . . the commission's recent decision not to permit farmland at Six Mile Ranch near Kamloops to be removed from the agricultural land reserve. Concurrently with the commission's consideration of that application, there was some debate in the Kamloops media about the ability of cabinet to declare a matter in the provincial interest and overrule the ALC."

That would be pressure, hon. Speaker.

"Although cabinet chose not to follow this route in the Six Mile case, it might be useful for future public discussions to understand the legal basis for provincial interest and clarify several misconceptions." ALR Advisory "readers may recall that when the Agricultural Land Commission Act was amended . . . to eliminate appeals of commission decisions to cabinet, the Legislative Assembly gave cabinet the option to remove land from the ALR if it was 'in the provincial interest' to do so. However, it is not a power of cabinet or anyone else to overrule the ALC. Cabinet must decide if an application involves the provincial interest."

He wrote that last November, at exactly the moment when those guys are saying we applied pressure.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Order, order. We will not proceed until there is some order in this chamber from all sides. I don't understand why two of you are standing. At this point would you please take your seats.

We have restored some order, and we're ready for the next question. I recognize the Opposition House Leader.

G. Farrell-Collins: What is clear in the law is that the Agricultural Land Commission has the power to make a decision. If at some point the government wishes to, it may declare a provincial interest and take that power itself in extraordinary circumstances. What the law does not say is that the Minister of Agriculture can go behind closed doors -- on the phone, on weekends, at night -- and twist the arm of the commissioners to get the agreement he wants, so that he doesn't have to invoke the provincial interest and offend members of his caucus. If you can't understand that, you don't deserve to be sitting in your chair on that side, hon. member.

The Speaker: Hon. member, through the Chair.

G. Farrell-Collins: If the Premier doesn't understand it, he doesn't deserve it either, hon. Speaker.

The Speaker: Hon. member, your question, please.

G. Farrell-Collins: When the Minister of Agriculture was sworn in, he received a briefing note. Let me quote from that briefing note: "Quasi-judicial or regulatory bodies have independent mandates and powers. You are advised to take very special care to avoid interfering or appearing to interfere in the decision-making function of the organization."

Hon. Speaker, if the member for Esquimalt lost his job for doing that, why doesn't the Minister of Agriculture?

The Speaker: Briefly, the Minister of Agriculture -- briefly.

Hon. C. Evans: One thing has been absolutely decided here for all ministers for all time, and that is: if the other side

[ Page 7272 ]

ever says that they want something declared in the provincial interest by the government, we'd better never do it. The moment you do it, they're going to call for you to resign, because they don't mean what they say.

The Speaker: The Opposition House Leader on a supplementary.

G. Farrell-Collins: What should be clear is that if the government intends to call it in the provincial interest, it should follow the law and not do it behind closed doors, not do it at night, not do it on the weekends and not do it by harassing and intimidating the chairman.

The Speaker: And your question.

G. Farrell-Collins: I want to repeat my question for the Minister of Agriculture. With those warnings and those words that were given to him when he was sworn in as a cabinet minister, a minister of the Crown, why is it that the member for Esquimalt-Metchosin loses his job when he violates it but the Minister of Agriculture does not?

The Speaker: I recognize the Premier.

Hon. G. Clark: It's obvious, if the member would look at it, that the circumstances are completely different. The Minister of Agriculture has the responsibility to consider this question. I want the members opposite to remember, to remind themselves not only of their legion of quotes, which they are now trying to deny, but of the fact that this has been a completely transparent process.

When we appointed Murray Rankin to work with the developer and talk to the Land Commission about how this could work to protect agricultural land and make this project go ahead, the Leader of the Opposition said: "What's the point of Rankin? Why can't Cathy McGregor advocate for that?" This has been published.

We went through this. Everybody knows exactly what happened. We appointed Murray Rankin. We reviewed the matter. It was a matter of public debate. I thought members opposite wanted us to proceed with declaring the provincial interest. They made comment after comment. Then, when it was obvious that the Rankin report was not going to necessarily satisfy the terms of the Land Commission, the government chose to exercise their legal power under the act to review this in the provincial interest.

The Speaker: Thank you, Premier.

Hon. G. Clark: It's absolutely clear, absolutely transparent, absolutely aboveboard and is the right decision.

[2:30]

COMPENSATION FOR PRE-1986 HEPATITIS C VICTIMS

G. Wilson: My question is to the Minister of Health. Yesterday the Deputy Prime Minister said that federal Health minister Rock was meeting with his counterparts, or talking with his counterparts, about changing the compensation package for hepatitis C. Has this minister been contacted by Mr. Rock or members of his office in that regard?

Hon. P. Priddy: The answer is no.

The Speaker: The member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast on a supplementary.

G. Wilson: I have a supplementary question to the Premier, and I ask this on behalf of Alexa McDonough, who doesn't seem to be getting an answer in the Commons. Her question was: "Will the Prime Minister say yes to compensation for all victims of hepatitis C?" The Hon. Herb Gray said: "I ask the hon. member why she does not direct her question to Premier Clark, the NDP Premier of British Columbia." So on behalf of Ms. McDonough, I will address this question to the Premier. Will the Premier now commit to providing compensation for all people infected with hepatitis C?

Hon. G. Clark: The member obviously raises a good question. I've made no secret of the fact that I'm uncomfortable with the decision reached by governments across the country and by the federal government. But we cannot and will not act unilaterally in British Columbia. We are part of a process, a tragedy in the history of our country, in terms of tainted blood. The federal government has the paramount responsibility to deal with that. The provinces have the cost implications associated with infection from hepatitis C.

We entered into the discussion in good faith with other provinces and the federal government to come up with a compensation package. The package which was announced is a step forward. Clearly it did not go far enough for all members, but a solution has to be arrived at with all provincial governments and the federal government. To date, this is the only step which all provinces and the federal government have agreed to.

MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND SIX MILE RANCH PROJECT

C. Clark: My question is to the Minister of Agriculture. I want to be absolutely crystal-clear about what he said today. He said that his ministry appointed Mr. Rankin to get a decision through the commission. They paid for that report to be produced. The minister called commissioners day and night stating his interest in the case, and then at the end of it, he exerted an inordinate amount of pressure on those commissioners to get what he wanted. And he says that that was his duty. Well, I would suggest that it was his duty instead to uphold the independence of the Agricultural Land Commission, and he did not do that.

The Speaker: Your question, hon. member.

C. Clark: Hon. Speaker, I ask the minister how he can sit there, knowing what we know about what he has done, about the calls he has made and the pressure he has brought to bear . . .

The Speaker: Your question.

C. Clark: . . . and tell us that he was not trying to influence the outcome of that decision by the commission.

The Speaker: Briefly, the hon. Minister of Agriculture.

Hon. C. Evans: Hon. Speaker, nothing the hon. member said in her prologue is true, and my statement . . . .

Interjections.

Hon. C. Evans: Nothing, hon. Speaker . . . .

Interjections.

[ Page 7273 ]

The Speaker: The minister has the floor.

Hon. C. Evans: It is my job to attempt to determine what the provincial interest is and when it is appropriate to use the provincial interest. The civil servant with whom I discuss that issue is the chair of the commission. And yes, that is my perception of my job; and no, I do not believe that that constitutes pressure on the commission.

The Speaker: Thank you, minister.

I recognize now, with a ministerial statement, the hon. Minister of Labour and Minister of Aboriginal Affairs.

Ministerial Statement

DAY OF MOURNING FOR WORKERS KILLED OR INJURED ON THE JOB

Hon. D. Lovick: A number of members have alluded to the fact that today, April 28, is the national Day of Mourning for Workers Killed or Injured on the Job. Thus there are flags flying at half-mast today on public buildings, on B.C. ferries and, indeed, on many other sites. I know that I speak for all members of this House when I say that we mourn the men and women killed on the job in British Columbia and those who have succumbed to illness resulting from their work. To their families, their friends and their co-workers we extend our deepest sympathy and respect. Their deaths are a tragic loss to their families and to their communities and indeed to all of us.

I would also like to acknowledge all of those workers who suffered workplace injuries and illnesses last year. The social, economic and human cost of workplace injuries is astounding. In fact, I would argue that it's appalling. Let me give you just a few examples. Every single day in British Columbia 751 workers are injured. Worse, 16 of those workers are permanently injured. Every week in this province three workers die from workplace injuries. The Workers Compensation Board will pay out nearly $1 billion as a result of injury claims this year.

But it is the human tragedy of shattered lives and families that constantly reminds us that we must improve workplace safety. Each and every worker killed on the job leaves behind a family that is devastated by the loss -- a loss from which many never recover. Let me tell you about just one of those families.

Jason Deederly was just 24 years old in April of 1997, when he was struck and killed by a loader while working in a sawmill in Port Alberni. By all accounts, it was a simple accident, indeed a preventable accident. Like all such accidents, it was one that changed the world for the most important persons in Jason's life. A devoted father, a loving husband, he left behind a wife, Alicia, and two young sons, Brendyn, five, and Ryan, two. As Alicia says, the hardest part was explaining to the children that their daddy wasn't coming home. Forever, after all, isn't part of a five-year-old's world.

A year later the loss is still keenly felt. Alicia, of course, has her work and her children. She tries to remember the good times and to not dwell on what might have been. As a measure of her strength and her desire to prevent this from happening to others, Alicia appears on this year's Day of Mourning poster from the Workers Compensation Board.

For the more than 150 British Columbia families who in the past year have lost their loved ones, I know that nothing will bring those individuals back. But by continuing to improve workplace safety and by rehabilitation and compensation services for injured workers, we can and will demonstrate our sincere respect for those who were injured or killed in the course of their employment. By committing ourselves to making British Columbia the safest province to work in, we will prove that we have learned from those tragedies. The working people of British Columbia deserve our greatest respect.

It is most fitting that we reinforce that commitment on this Day of Mourning for Workers Killed or Injured on the Job.

I would ask all members of the chamber, Madam Speaker, to please join me now in a minute of silence in memory of those workers who lost their lives in the workplace.

C. Hansen: When the minister started his remarks, he said something to the effect that he knew that he was speaking for all members of the chamber when we mourn the loss of those who were injured on worksites. Certainly he was speaking for the opposition as well as for the government side when he made those comments.

Clearly there will always be injuries in the workplace. There will always be fatalities that happen to people who are working to build this province. I think our job as legislators is to work together to make sure that we do everything that's within the power of government, everything that's in the power of this chamber, to make sure that we can minimize the loss in the workplace in British Columbia. We certainly look forward to working with government to make sure that worker safety is a priority and to make sure that we can reduce the number of fatalities in the future.

G. Wilson: I seek leave to respond to the ministerial statement.

Leave granted.

G. Wilson: My comments will be very brief. I want to share the minister's concern for those families who have lost members because of workplace accidents. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Minister of Labour for working with me to assist a gentleman who for 26 days sat outside this building on a hunger strike. I think we have finally found a way to resolve his concerns, and I think we have finally, after 26 days of a hunger strike, found a way to make this person's life just a little better.

I think that there are many issues with respect to those who are injured in the workplace and whose injuries shatter their lives, shatter their families. I look forward to reviewing with care the document tabled today on the Workers Compensation Act amendments. Clearly we must do more to protect workers in British Columbia and, more importantly, to look after not only those who are left as a result of those killed but, in particular, those whose lives are shattered because of long-term disabilities. I think that there can be no more important issue before us today than to care for those people who work on behalf of all British Columbians in the workplace.

Petitions

S. Hawkins: I rise to table a petition signed by 1,100 citizens of Golden and the surrounding rural area, and it reads:

"We, the undersigned citizens of Golden and the surrounding rural area, recognize that there is a crisis in rural health care.

[ Page 7274 ]

We protest the government's apparent lack of serious interest in resolving this issue. Golden is in danger of losing medical practitioners without chance of replacement. We are asking that the government make the necessary expenditures of our tax money to bring this issue to a satisfactory resolution before we lose our physicians."

Orders of the Day

Hon. J. MacPhail: In Committee A, I call Committee of Supply. For the information of the members, we'll be debating the estimates of the Attorney General, and perhaps Women's Equality. In this House, I call second reading of the Tuition Fee Freeze Act.

TUITION FEE FREEZE ACT

(second reading continued)

G. Wilson: This morning, prior to lunch, I had the opportunity to listen to members of the official opposition and some members of government in the debate of the tuition freeze act. I confess that I'm not quite sure how the official opposition's going to vote on this issue, but I did certainly register many of their concerns with respect to the tuition freeze. I think that many of the points that were raised are valid points.

[2:45]

[W. Hartley in the chair.]

I guess that one of the issues we have to address when we talk about a tuition freeze act is why anybody who has knowledge of students -- or who has students in their own family or who has been a student or has understood the financial difficulty that students face -- would oppose freezing tuition. Why would anybody say that the freezing of tuition is a bad thing? And frankly, I didn't hear anybody on either side of the House in this chamber say freezing tuition was a bad thing.

The second question is: why do we have to do it by the introduction of

an act? Why do we have to have an imposition on universities, colleges, technical institutions and so on by this government to impose this level of freeze? That's a more fundamental issue, and it speaks more to the principle that's involved in this particular act. It is the reason why I will not support this act and, in fact, will vote against it. Let me tell you why.

I have never, never supported government-imposed wage or price control, because wage and price control does not promote within the marketplace the opportunity for people to find new, different and more creative ways of delivering the kinds of services that they need. Neither does it provide the opportunity to put in place a system of payment for services rendered that in fact offers the opportunity for people to attract new business.

This government is engaged -- albeit through various different pieces of legislation or through actions of various people with respect to collective agreements -- in instituting wage and price controls in British Columbia. If you doubt me, take a look at ICBC rates. They're frozen. Why? Because it was an edict of the Premier that they be frozen. We're now looking at a tuition freeze. That's frozen. Why? Because this government has deemed that it is essential to freeze tuition.

Let's take a look at the recent deal between the B.C. teachers and the government -- recognizing that it hasn't been agreed to by anybody else. This government has indicated that the public sector workers will get zero, zero and 2. That's their bottom line. There's no negotiation here. That's what the government says you will have -- zero, zero and 2. That is wage control.

It's wage control instituted by a government who firmly believe that what they have to do is control the economy; who believe that it is their goal, their role, their responsibility and duty to determine what, in the public sector, will be funded, how much it will be funded by, and when it should be funded and when it will not.

I have two children who are in university -- one in this province and one in Nova Scotia. I'll tell you, I know what the burden of costs is. I'm assisting those students, where I can, to attend university, so I'm fully aware of what the costs of university services are. Now, it's interesting in my discussions, when I talk about the costs associated with my son in university . . . . And it's interesting that, having concluded his studies, he's with us in the chamber today listening to this debate. He will tell you that the tuition freeze doesn't stop the rising costs of going to university.

He will tell you firsthand that it doesn't stop the rising costs, because the fact of the matter is that universities have to address the rising costs of the delivery of education.

Maybe what the minister ought to do, since the minister is so determined to put constraints on the economy, is say: "Well, now that we've frozen tuition fees, let's put in place a regulation that says that any student who is paying rent cannot have his or her rent increased during the time that they are in school" -- because that's an added cost to students. "Let's put on a rent freeze." Shall we then say that if they have to travel and because they don't have public transit available, maybe what we should do is put in place a freeze on their increased costs of fuel?

And while we're at it, why don't we freeze the rising hydro costs to the universities themselves, and say that what we're going to do is recognize that all those other aspects of university costs are to be frozen as well so that the university doesn't feel it necessary to have to find alternative ways of raising money in order to keep the cost of education affordable?

What we're seeing here is wage and price control, pure and simple. I've never agreed with it. I don't believe in government-imposed restrictions. I think that they are wrong. I think that it is counterproductive, and I think that this government really needs to give itself a serious shake in terms of its policy development process.

Let's be clear that the minister has said that when they took office, we had the highest tuition in Canada and we're now the second-lowest.

Hon. A. Petter: The second-highest.

G. Wilson: I stand corrected -- the minister said the second-highest. And we're now the second-lowest. That may be true. It kind of goes along with our economy, because when they took over, we had the highest economic growth rate in Canada, and now we have the lowest. It seems that everything is sinking to the bottom together. And I don't say that glibly. I don't argue that glibly, because this is a much broader question than whether or not we should simply try to put a freeze on one particular aspect of economic demand -- that is, tuition.

It speaks to intervention in the economy that this government doesn't seem to have a grasp on. You cannot put in place some kind of mandatory freeze and not expect that there's going to be a consequence down the road. The cost side of the situation will continue to rise.

So while you may in fact say that we're going to have a freeze on tuition for one more year, let's acknowledge that the students who are going to university starting this year have got four or five, or maybe even six years ahead of them. If the

[ Page 7275 ]

costs continue to rise, there will be a need to catch up at some point, to be able to then deliver the money to those institutions which are having to carry those costs. Or, if we don't take that option, we're going to say that they're going to reduce service. It's just that simple.

Let me tell you how this is impacting on our economy. Let me use another example of exactly this kind of philosophy -- that we can impose freezes. We had an imposition for seven years . . . . I'm told that for seven years we've seen absolutely no fiscal movement toward increased funding for K-to-12 education. That's what I'm told. In fact, I think that was the quote, almost directly, from the president of BCTF today. He said that for seven years the system has been strangled, and that's why we now need a $150 million influx -- to try and catch up and bring us to 1996 and to cover contract obligations up to 1996.

We know what happened back in the days of Social Credit, when there was no money spent on upgrading, servicing and maintaining a ferry fleet because it was deemed that we needed to keep costs low. "So let's not take realistically what the costs of those services are." When this government came in, they said, all of a sudden: "We're faced with a crisis. We now have to catch up." We've been warned that when the freeze on ICBC rates finally comes off, if we haven't seen a substantive decrease in demand . . . . Right now the evidence suggests there is a downward trend, and that's a good thing.

We've been warned, however, that when that freeze comes off there's going to have to be a catch-up. There's nothing particularly new or strange or different about it; it's what happens when you put an artificial constraint, or an imposed constraint, on prices, on wages. What it tends to do is generally drive the economy down.

I think that students are paying adequately to go to university. I certainly don't advocate that they pay any more; I've never advocated that they pay any more. But you don't need legislation to make sure that tuition doesn't go up.

What you need is a cooperative approach to educational funding that recognizes that those people who are in the administration of the institutions, those people who are in the student unions, those people who are in the faculty associations, those people in the Ministry of Education who are in the funding of post-secondary education should sit down and work out an adequate model of four-year-based financing to put a long-term financial plan in place to make sure our universities are adequately and properly funded so that students can afford to go.

If you do that, you will recognize that some programs, some courses, may in fact warrant an increase in tuition and that others may not.

You build flexibility into a system that says: "What we will do now is recognize that there are variable demands within the system and that we're going to have to make sure that the cost of services matches those variable demands." For example, in a community college it's not unusual to see a huge student demand go towards things like introductory psychology or some of the other introductory courses that are associated as prerequisites with some of the more popular programs of studies.

Often there are long, long waiting lists to get into those courses, because students are told that they have to take those courses if they're going to get a degree in something else. For the minister to say that there is no student who doesn't get their course today . . . . That's just not true; there are many students who can't get into the courses they want -- many, many don't today. You know what? That's a fact of a growing population with the realistic aspect of the inability of institutions to expand exponentially to meet those demands. I don't think that that's something we're going to get away from.

What we have to do is be a whole lot more flexible.

But you don't introduce wage and price controls. Hon. Speaker, that is the goal of this government: to manage the economy. We've seen it in many aspects. I wonder if the minister, in his closing remarks, might address himself to some aspects . . . . If we're going to freeze tuition, does that mean we're going to have an extended freeze on salaries? If it means we're going to have an extended freeze on salaries, what does that say about the collective bargaining process? Or are we going to do what we did with respect to BCTF bargaining?

The government comes in and says: "You get $150 million for all of this if you take this deal which freezes your salaries at zero, zero and 2, because that's what we want in the public sector. And, by gosh, if we can get the BCTF to agree, well, hey, we've got a better chance with CUPE, BCGEU and HEU" -- and all the rest of the so-called bargaining agents who are in a so-called free collective bargaining process with respect to wages. It's wage and price control.

You know, as a government . . . . I don't think that imposed wage and price control is a good idea. It does not reflect the realities of the market, whether it's in post-secondary education, whether it's for government employees or whether it's for any other aspect of life in British Columbia. What it does is create an unrealistic expectation with respect to those people who are beneficiaries. If you talk to students . . . . The member for New Westminster was on his feet saying: "I was talking to these students, and there wasn't one of them who didn't want a freeze on tuition." What a surprise!

What a surprise that students who were going to have to pay more tuition would say: "Yes, please freeze my tuition." Why wouldn't they? I would -- sure I would. But our job here isn't to give a knee-jerk reaction to people who say, "Give me this; give me that," even though we want to, even though we understand there is an economic problem. Government doesn't come in and impose on the universities, colleges, institutes, technical training institutions -- or vocational training programs -- unrealistic constraints with respect to what people can be charged in order for courses to be taught.

That imposition is going to cause problems further down that road, because the cost side of the equation is not also frozen -- unless there's something more to come here. Maybe what we're going to do is have a complete, unabashed statement of wage and price controls by this government, so that in fact the government can in fact fully control, fully manipulate and fully decide what in the economy should or shouldn't proceed. Maybe this is a signal to say that we are now going to be interventionist in the purest terms.

Hon. Speaker, I've been doing a little bit of reading on this just to make sure that I'm not off base, because I wouldn't want to be off base in my comments.

Interjection.

G. Wilson: Well, the member asks: "Why wouldn't you want to be off base?" I'm trying to be different than the members opposite; that's the main reason.

I went back and did a little bit of reading on what happened the last time we tried to put in imposed wage and price controls, and post-secondary education was part of that area. Just to give some credentials here, in case anybody thinks that I don't have some credentials . . . . Maybe they don't like my credentials, but nevertheless here they are. I served for a number of years as president of the Capilano College Faculty Association, and I served twice as the chief negotiator in those rounds of negotiations. Therefore I was directly involved in discussions around the funding of post-secondary education

[ Page 7276 ]

at the college level. I worked very closely with the bursar, the president and the association in those days to look at exactly what was going on with respect to educational funding.

[3:00]

The culprit of the day -- which is still out there today, and this government has done nothing to change it in its six or seven years of mandate -- is formula funding and the process by which post-secondary education is funded. You see, hon. Speaker, it tends to reduce the cost of educational service to the lowest common denominator. It's completely unrealistic, because the costs associated with teaching certain programs and courses are greater.

If you are a science student, for example, and you have a great deal of lab work which requires a whole bunch of different services and supplies, and if there are additional costs with respect to the program you're dealing with, the costs are going to be greater than if you are in a general arts program, where the greatest cost is the salary of the instructor, paying for the heat and light in the building which you are in and perhaps having access to some textbooks and library research services.

But if you actually have to deal with chemicals and the cost of putting in place expensive equipment to do scientific testing, that becomes a more expensive proposition.

One way the colleges turned around was that they said: "Okay, we're going to charge you lab fees, because the cost of materials for these labs go up." The colleges and universities can't put a ceiling on what the costs of the supplies for science labs are, nor can they put a ceiling on the cost of the equipment they may need to be modern and on the leading edge of science and technology. But this legislation says that they have to. They're going to have to, because it says, "If there was any mandatory ancillary fee . . . . " That ancillary fee could be a lab fee; that's the way I read it.

That means you can't increase it. So if they can't increase the ancillary fee for your science lab, what are the colleges going to do? They're going to reduce the number of students who can get into that science lab. Why? Because they can't afford not to -- that's why.

Wouldn't it be a whole lot more creative if the government turned round and said: "What we're going to attempt to do here is find a way to put in place a flexible funding program, do it over a four-year base so that universities and colleges can do long-term planning and see if we can attract investment from other sources in order to assist those institutions that are involved in new science and technology research programs to provide funding for those programs, so that it is affordable to students and so that those institutions can in fact afford to be at the leading edge of new science and technology research"?

Wouldn't it be a whole lot more creative to do that than to come in and simply say: "Look how wonderful we are. We're going to put on a tuition freeze. And we're going to legislate it and impose it"? Government is really good at imposing things on people these days, whether it's the imposition of a tuition freeze or the imposition of a collective agreement, which is what we're doing in the K-to-12 sector -- an imposition of a collective agreement that recognizes zero, zero and 2.

Interjection.

G. Wilson: The minister is saying: "An imposition?" Yes. The reality is that it's an imposition. You put $150 million on the table, and you say: "Take it or leave it." I can tell you . . . .

Interjection.

G. Wilson: Then the minister perhaps might want to get up and get into this debate to tell us whether, if the teachers and/or the trustees turn it down, this government will or will not legislate and impose that agreement. There's a good question.

Let me say that it is imposition. It's government imposition. Instead of being creative and working with the educational industry, instead of saying we're going to find ways to be flexible and to be able to put in place new flexible funding programs, or that we are going to attract investments and cooperative work within the industry, attract opportunities for unions to get involved more directly in skills and labour programs so we can have our vocational institutions actually training workers who are well-skilled and well-paid, what we're going to do is turn around and impose an arbitrary fee, a freeze on tuition.

I know what will happen. The government is going to go out and spin to the Canadian Federation of Students and to their affiliates in British Columbia that the PDA opposes a freeze of tuition, that the PDA member over there -- the leader of the Progressive Democratic Alliance -- stood up in the Legislative Assembly and said that he supported the increase in tuition fees. "That member over there" -- that's what they'll say -- "opposed the students' need to freeze tuition." That's what they'll spin.

Interjection.

G. Wilson: Oh, as the member for Skeena says, it'll try to avoid talking about the PDA. I don't doubt that they'll try to avoid talking about it, because we're quickly becoming a much better option than that team over there.

Let me say that when they come out and say that, I hope that those people -- other than the ones, of course, who are actively working on the NDP campaign -- might really start to think a little bit long-term on what we're dealing with here. They want to take a much more pragmatic approach. I do not support students having to pay more, because I know that many of them can't, for reasons that many members of the Liberal opposition have already raised.

It's hard to get a job in British Columbia as a student, to be able to make a livable wage so you can actually earn enough money to be able to afford to go back to school. Youth unemployment is rising to record numbers under this administration. That's what the statistics tell us, and those statistics are hard to dispute.

I also know how tough it is to get affordable housing if you're a young person in British Columbia today. I know how tough it is if you live outside of Vancouver, Victoria -- the urban triangle, as I call the Nanaimo-Victoria-Vancouver area. I know how tough it is for you to be able to get access to post-secondary education, especially if you're trying to go beyond what is offered at the community colleges, which are constrained by this very kind of interventionist policy of this government from being able to put in place a broader base of educational funding options in order to be able to give a broader base of educational options for those people who want to get it.

I understand the plight of those students. I work with those students -- and I have in the past and will in the future -- to make sure that we can find affordable, effective ways to get people into school. This, in this second reading, is talking to the principles of a tuition freeze act. It's price control -- a legislated, mandated, imposed price control.

When you look at the zero, zero, 2 that came down with the BCTF, that is legislated wage control. That's what this government is doing. It is imposing wage control and price control through their intervention in what should be a free

[ Page 7277 ]

collective bargaining process, on the one hand, and in what should be, on a much broader base, educational funding for post-secondary education.

So when I vote against this, and I will stand and vote against . . . . I don't know how others are going to do it, and that's up to them and their caucus, I suppose. I will oppose it. I understand the political risk in doing so, because I understand the way those out there will go out and spin it and say: "Here's a guy who's opposed to students. Here's somebody who isn't pro-student. Here's somebody who wants to increase the costs to students."

I'll tell you, the reason I can stand up with conviction and vote against it . . . . In all the conversations from the Liberal opposition, I didn't hear if they were voting for or against it. I guess we'll find out when we get to the vote. The reason I will stand up and say so in my remarks is because, philosophically and in principle, I oppose government intervention where you impose price controls, because that means you have to impose wage controls, and it means that the government has to become more interventionist in the marketplace.

Whenever a government has done that in the past -- when good old Uncle Pierre did it in Ottawa, back in 1975 -- we saw immediately that the costs . . . . And he was a Liberal. He was a good Liberal and a good intellectual Canadian. Even when he did it, we found that the problem with that was rising costs.

I want to change gears here a bit. This government may argue that this will not increase costs, that in fact they have got it all in hand, and that they've got some way of trying to mitigate against that. Let's look at that side of this argument for just a moment. If you have an imposition of wage and price controls -- and that's what we've got here -- there are only two ways in which we can keep level balance or some balance in the marketplace, whether it's in the education marketplace or any other.

You have to mitigate against that freeze -- because those are revenues that are not coming in -- by either delivering less service or removing choice in terms of the kinds of services that you can get. In other words, in the case of post-secondary education, you either have fewer options or courses offered in the long term, or you eliminate the variety of programs that you will be able to get access to. In the universities, in most cases, they're saying that.

Because this government says they're not allowed to have students lining up for courses, what they're going to do is expand the number of introductory courses that are popular because they are prerequisites to further studies that have to be done. By eliminating those lineups, we will simply get rid of whole programs.

Look at the community colleges -- and I challenge anybody in this Legislature to do it. When you look at the community colleges, universities and technical institutes, you will see that they are no longer offering certain programs.

You're better off, when you're dealing with an FTE -- that is, a full-time-equivalent, which is part of the formula funding, which is part of the problem -- to get rid of the whole program than to tinker around with trying to offer some little bit more and then find that students end up with being able to take first and second year but not being able to get into third or fourth year and therefore finding themselves redirected or having to go to a different institution.

The response from administrators and deans -- people who sit down and try to work these things out -- was to say: "If we have these kinds of fiscal restraints, we're going to eliminate whole programs." One of the areas that you can see this . . . . This is kind of an interesting thing, because when we talk about teachers and imposition of collective agreements, it's teachers who want to upgrade. Do you know, hon. Speaker, that there's an amazing statistic that the majority of teachers upgrading in this province are doing it through American correspondence? That's interesting, isn't it?

They use American programs, through correspondence, to provide additional education to teachers, to requalify them to teach Canadians -- they go to Americans who teach Canadians to teach Canadian children. When you talk to the universities and ask them about that, you'll find that many of those programs certified in the United States operate in British Columbia, and they use university facilities that are Canadian. Yet there's no charge for that: the libraries, some of the research institutes . . . .

I like our neighbours to the south. I think they are wonderful people. I have nothing against the Americans. But surely to goodness, when you see those programs being cut within the line offerings of the universities in Canada, in some of those instance you really have to ask the question: why is this happening? What are we doing here? Why are we not putting those priorities into those university educational courses? The reason they'll give you back is that it's easier to cut lines and programs than it is to try to cut horizontally. Take a lateral cut, and get rid of the program, because cutting horizontally in the program leaves inequity in the kinds of courses that are delivered.

That's one of the ways that you mitigate against it: you simply offer less. You provide a less broad-based educational offering. You diminish career programs and career course offerings. We've seen that with nurses in the past in British Columbia -- why we're trying to hire more.

Now, with respect to the hiring of people going into the social services ministry . . . . The Minister for Children and Families was on the CBC the other day confirming that yes, with the increased hiring, many of them will have to be hired from outside British Columbia, because we don't have enough trained from inside British Columbia. That's what tells you that something is pretty wrong in B.C.

The second way you do it is have the government go out and borrow on behalf of those students to enable the money to keep going into the university. And gosh by golly, when you take a look at borrowing, man, I'll tell you that this government has got all the rest beat.

When the minister of post-secondary education stood up and said, "We have the lowest of all the provinces except Quebec," what he failed to recognize is that all of those other provinces have taken on the obligation and responsibility to bring in a balanced budget. And you know what? They are now starting to develop surpluses. And with surplus revenues, they will be able to provide legitimate funding for post-secondary education -- funding that is not borrowed capital.

What this government has decided to do is forgo any kind of fiscal obligation it may have to move toward a balanced budget, and simply borrow more. Proof of that is right in this year's budget: $31.2 billion. We're going up $1.2 billion in borrowed capital. That's a deficit of $949 million running this year.

So we may have an imposed tuition freeze here, with respect to this act. How have we managed it in B.C.? In two ways: by cutting program offerings, tying the hands of universities, and technical training institutes, and by borrowing more money so that we give an illusion -- and a false illusion at that. I thought for a moment that that was redundant, but actually it isn't, because the illusion is that somehow we're going to be fiscally better off. That's what the minister said: "This is about our future." Well, he's right.

[ Page 7278 ]

[3:15]

We have got to take responsibility for putting in place long-term, four-year-based financing. Get rid of formula funding. Start to allow the universities, colleges and vocational institutes to put in place more flexible funding options so that we have a broader base of course offerings for British Columbians, and start to treat British Columbians with a little bit more common sense. That doesn't mean imposition of wage and price controls. This government is going to put wage controls on public sector employment and employees, and it's going to put price controls into this kind of legislation.

So there are good reasons to vote against this bill, and I hope that all members of this House will reflect carefully on the words I've spoken so that they may decide how they will vote as well.

C. Hansen: I rise and ask leave to make an introduction.

Leave granted.

C. Hansen: In the gallery, as we speak, are 57 students from Lord Kitchener Elementary School in the riding of Vancouver-Quilchena. They're accompanied by their teachers Marta Adamovitch, Dana Peterson and Sara Nymark, and 11 parents. I hope the House will join me in making them very welcome this afternoon.

G. Abbott: It's a pleasure to rise and join in the debate on Bill 8 today. I'm actually looking forward to speaking briefly on this bill and adding my perspective to this debate. Hopefully I can speak to this debate from at least a couple of perspectives, and perhaps a third as well. I have been a student at university, a little later on I was a college instructor, and I'm soon to be a parent with a child in college and university. So I hope that I can add those perspectives to this debate.

As a student in the 1970s, I suspect that I was concerned with many of the things that a student in the late 1990s would be concerned with as well. However, the seventies were certainly a different time than what we have today in the 1990s. For those of us old enough to remember -- and I guess there are a few of the members across the way that are -- the economy was in an inflationary mode at that time. The cost of living increased dramatically from year to year, and wages, in most cases, increased dramatically from year to year.

For the life of me, I can't remember whether tuition fees were expanding by the same rate; perhaps they were -- I don't know. That certainly would have been an important consideration in university in those days, but it's not something that I remember as well as the wage increases and the cost of living increases that we were suffering through at that time.

In the 1970s tuition fees represented a relatively small part of the cost of a university education in British Columbia. Certainly tuition fees were a significant part of it, but they were clearly a smaller expenditure -- at least for me, leaving home and going away to university. Clearly tuition fees were a smaller part of the cost of education in those times than things like rent, which seemed to me to be a very important cost at the time. Food, obviously, and the other provisions of life were a more expensive part of the cost of education at the time.

As well, there were things comparable in cost to tuition fees, like books, supplies, fees and so on. All of those things were important parts of the cost of education back in the 1970s.

I suspect much of that is true today, although mercifully for students attending university in the late 1990s, many of the things which were the object of inflationary increases in the 1970s aren't so in the 1990s. I suspect that in most instances, what students hope for in terms of accessing a college and university education in the late 1990s is similar to what I would have looked for in the 1970s. It's important to note that among the things a student in the late 1990s would seek -- and given that we're talking about this bill, I'll note it first -- is predictability, stability and certainty in tuition fees.

No one wants to enter second, third or fourth year university and discover that tuition fees have jumped by 5 percent, 10 percent or 25 percent, as may have been the case back in the 1970s. It would clearly limit the access of a student to a college or university in British Columbia, were we to see those kinds of increases at this time. Students will welcome that predictability and stability with respect to their tuition fees.

Similarly, I suspect that students today would welcome what we have in the general economy, fortunately -- relative stability with respect to living costs. Fortuitously, the cost of food and rent and all those things doesn't jump dramatically from year to year for students in the present times, and this is a great advantage to students as well. I'm not sure if the same thing can be said for books. It seems -- at least, as I recall as a college instructor -- that there were quite dramatic increases in the cost of books in the 1980s.

I'm not sure if that's the case today, but I'm sure students would welcome predictability and stability in those costs and certainly in the miscellaneous fees that go along with college as well.

The other thing that students would like from their colleges and universities -- and this is again very important to note -- is a full range of course offerings when the students want to take them.

This has been the object of some vigorous debate in the chamber today -- the question of whether students, when they attend Okanagan University College, UNBC, University College of the Cariboo, UBC, UVic or whatever, are able to access the full range of courses that they want to pass in order to receive a bachelor of arts or bachelor of science degree, master's degree or whatever it happens to be that they are pursuing. Is that full range of course offerings there when they need it?

I know that I and many of my colleagues on this side of the House have heard of instances where students have not been able to access the range of courses that they want and need to fulfil their educational goals. I think it's an important point to note that there are costs in providing that range of courses. With the tuition freeze here, that opportunity is going to be limited just a little bit more in colleges and universities across the province.

The other things that students would very much like, hon. Speaker, from society and from colleges and universities are comprehensive and current libraries. This presents a very significant challenge to post-secondary institutions in British Columbia today. Libraries are a very expensive part of their operations, but obviously they are a critical part of the operations in that students need to have that current, comprehensive material in order to do good term papers and so on and to learn the things that they need to in a rapidly changing world.

Finally, at least on the very short list that I have of the things that students want and need in order to complete college and university, is summer employment. Certainly in the 1970s there was lots of summer employment around. I don't think that I ever suffered for lack of a job as I made my way through university. Regrettably, that can't be said of the situation today in British Columbia. According to the statistics that I've seen, we are looking at something close to a 19 percent youth unemployment rate in British Columbia today. Youth unemployment has increased dramatically over time, and it has increased dramatically during the tenure of this

[ Page 7279 ]

government. I understand that we now have the highest youth unemployment rate in this country west of Quebec -- a very lamentable statistic indeed and one that I think will cause a great deal of concern to students as they try to finance their way through university without heavy recourse to student loans.

I also want to talk briefly, more from the perspective of a former educator in this province, about the challenges that the colleges and universities face, particularly in a situation where the government takes away more and more of their options to meet these challenges. In the 1990s, as I'm sure you're well aware, colleges and universities must of necessity be operating not only as educational institutions but as businesses as well.

As in the case of municipal governments in this province, I'm not sure whether universities and colleges are actually compelled by any sort of law or regulation to balance their budget. But I think the obvious conclusion, regardless of whether it's overtly stated or not, is that any educational institution that repeatedly produces deficit budgets is probably going to see a change of management in the nearer rather than the more distant future.

So there is a compulsion, I think, on the part of post-secondary institutions to operate in a very businesslike fashion and to be concerned not only with the quality of education that they're providing to students in this province but also with meeting the proverbial bottom line. They cannot afford to produce an endless series of deficits.

Hopefully they are not following too closely the performance of this government with respect to the production of deficits. If they did, of course, our institutions might also end up with the kind of deficit and debt problems that this government faces.

So they need to have some concern for the bottom line, the balanced budget, as well as for the educational objects of the institution. In producing a budget annually, educational institutions go through many of the same processes that a business or indeed a government would. They have to look at all of the elements on the expenditure side and control those elements that are within their ability to control. They have to go through the revenue side and, obviously, control those elements on the revenue side which they can control, and out of that process produce what hopefully will be either a modest surplus or a balanced budget.

Among the things that government obviously is going to be keenly concerned with on the expenditure side -- I'm not sure if this is first and foremost, but it's certainly going to be close to it if it's not -- is teaching costs. In some cases, perhaps, although I'm not sure that this is true in any case . . . . But in most cases, institutions will not have direct control over increases in teaching costs. The bargaining, as I recall, for the most

part is done between provincial associations and the employer representatives from the institutions. So teaching costs when I was a college instructor -- I don't know what they've been doing lately -- typically rose by 1 or 2 percent or perhaps 3 percent a year. But they rarely stay at zero, and to my knowledge, they have never contracted. I suspect that educational institutions in this province this year are probably looking at -- I don't know -- a 1 percent increase, or whatever. But it's likely that they'll be going up somewhat.

In addition to the university professors or college instructors and the increased cost of those, there are ongoing labour costs. In every case with a post-secondary institution, there is a substantial physical plant which has to be maintained. Of course, there are employees who do that. For the most part, the costs there generally are accelerating at some low level these days as well.

Again, library costs, as we've noted, are a very substantial part of the budget of universities. There are never enough books. In this world of mass communication, there are enormous demands to keep improving the libraries. It's a very difficult thing for the institutions to keep up with, yet in order to be credible institutions they have to do so. Typically, the growth in library costs is well beyond anything associated with inflationary costs and is considerable indeed. New equipment, like computers . . . .

To be current, in order to be able to offer the kind of courses, expertise and so on that universities and colleges should, there is constant pressure on them to be upgrading their computers so that students are learning state-of-the-art, not prehistoric, elements about computer science and so on. To summarize the expenditure side, clearly the costs that universities and colleges face, because of their nature, always exceed any inflationary increase that we find in the economy generally.

[3:30]

On the revenue side, there are not necessarily going to be corresponding increases. Frequently, institutions have to rely on the largesse of government in order to balance things out. Among the things that college and university managers can look at on the revenue side are certainly the grants from provincial and/or federal governments. They have miscellaneous fees, parking fees and so on, which I guess -- up until this bill passes -- they can manipulate to some extent. And they have tuition fees.

Those, I think, are probably three of the major elements that college and university administrators, when they are trying to put forward a budget that's going to work for their institutions, manipulate in some ways in order to hopefully achieve something resembling a balanced budget.

There are really relatively few options that colleges and universities have in manipulation of the variables, on both the expenditure and the revenue sides. If in 1999 a college or university had been planning on a modest 2 percent increase in tuition fees, for example, in order to help cover off increased teaching costs or other costs, that variable will now be removed.

So in considering this bill, we have to think of the impact on the student not only from the perspective of their personal finances but also in terms of their access to the courses that they need. Certainly I think everyone in this chamber and probably everyone in British Columbia would say, superficially at least, that zero percent or a cap or a tuition freeze is a positive thing.

However, even though zero percent may sound much better than a 2 percent increase, if that freeze in tuition fees is going to result in a reduction in the course offerings at any college or university, then for the student the impact is a far less positive thing and in fact may be a negative thing. Again, I've heard of some instances where college and university students are not able to access the programs that they want and need in the year that they want and need them; in fact, they're forced to go back to university for an additional year in order to achieve that goal.

If they're forced to do that -- if a student is forced to go back for an extra year -- the cost of that in terms of rent and the cost of living, for things like food and so on, is going to far exceed the modest increase which a 2 percent tuition fee might bring along.

I'm sure that the members on the other side -- and the minister, in particular -- will argue that this is going to be just fine, that they're going to maintain the course offerings and freeze tuition and so on. Well, that may be the case. We'll see about that. I can tell you from personal experience, though, that this was not the case in the early 1990s -- I guess it would

[ Page 7280 ]

have been -- when the government of former Premier Harcourt decided that for a year or two they were going to put a tuition freeze in place. I can tell you that it was not the case. I was on the faculty of Okanagan University College at the time. We used to spend Friday afternoons talking about how we were going to keep the range of courses going at Okanagan University College despite the freeze on tuition. It did have an important role in actually eliminating some courses from some centres.

Again, as I said earlier, there are relatively few options which a college or university administrator has in dealing with this problem when it comes along. If the possibility of a modest tuition increase is taken away, the loss, the shortfall, has to be offset from somewhere or there's going to be a course reduction. In the case of the former government in the early 1990s, there was not an offset. As a consequence, there was a very direct reduction of courses. As a consequence, students suffered from that, even though I suppose the members opposite might think that they should be profoundly grateful for the freeze that had been offered to them.

The problem, as I've noted before, was that there were wage increases at the time. There were, at the time, labour cost increases related to the physical plant people, the library and the equipment and so on. In all of these things, the institution was simply unable to keep up with the demands and at the same time accommodate the tuition freeze which had been put in place by the former government, the Harcourt government.

The upshot of all this is that unless offsetting financial provisions are put in place by the government to cover the shortfall from the tuition freeze, the freeze is going to have a negative impact on students in the province of British Columbia. Specifically, the freeze will have two consequences. One, it will mean a reduction in access to courses, and it may mean that students have to spend a longer time at university than they would otherwise like to spend. As well, and this is the second consequence, it is going -- in the distant future, hopefully, but I suspect not -- to build up pressure for a much larger increase at some point in the future.

Hon. A. Petter: Not under this government.

G. Abbott: The minister says not under this government. Well, we'll see about that. As I have been saying, unless this government is prepared to keep up with the offsetting shortfalls that come from tuition freezes . . .

Interjection.

G. Abbott: . . . then we are going to see students suffer in the near term.

He says: "We're doing it." But you certainly weren't doing it back in the early 1990s. I can tell you for a fact, and administrators across this province can tell you for a fact, that the actions of this NDP government led very directly to reductions in course offerings at colleges and universities across this province.

I just want to conclude with this: politics has been noted in millions of political science courses as the allocation of scarce resources. Politics is also "who gets what, when, where and why." My concern is that having started down this road of tuition freezes, it's difficult to imagine this government ever leaving it. As we have been hearing from the minister, we can continuously offer tuition freezes, but this only remains a positive move if the government can afford to keep making the universities and colleges whole in terms of course offerings. If they can't do that . . . .

Regrettably, we have seen far too many instances of where this government has offered up hollow promises, only to disappoint people in the very near future. Let's hope that we don't see that in this case.

Education is a very important, very essential service in this province. Let's hope that we can continue to offer quality education to students, not only in high school and elementary school but also in colleges and universities. I hope this government can look beyond the next photo opportunity and the next press release and actually do some planning and managing in terms of ensuring that our colleges and universities can continue to offer that quality education in the long term.

Thank you, hon. Speaker, and I trust the government will give sufficient weight to my words.

G. Robertson: I rise today to speak on Bill 8 and in support of it. We have frozen tuition fees in this province for the third year in a row. I have to tell you that's an initiative that I'm extremely proud of. We have done this at the same time that the federal government has decreased post-secondary education funding by almost $90 million. I guess what concerns me is that the opposition leader supports the cuts, and not only that, he says the cuts don't go far enough. That's an interesting policy and one that concerns me greatly.

The member for Okanagan West spoke this morning, and the member said: "We have a policy." The member for Okanagan-Vernon earlier this year suggested otherwise. The member said on February 4, on "Voice of the Province":

"We are in the process right now of reviewing all policy because of changes that have occurred in British Columbia. Some of the issues we ran on in the election of '96 are not exactly the same as they are now. But this is something that if you ask me in three more months, I'll have a much more solid answer for you."

That's what was said in regard to policy. It's a policy of changing policy, a policy of inconsistency, a different policy on different days. Their policy in the 1996 election was also quite interesting: it seems they forgot to include post-secondary education in their 1996 election platform. I guess that's concerning.

I would like to talk to you a little more about some of the comments I have heard in regards to this tuition freeze that concern me. The member for Okanagan East said on March 27 that "the freeze in tuition fees was no doubt a political decision made to obtain photo opportunities during an election, rather than a decision based on sound economic principles." I think this is absolutely scandalous.

On March 6, the member for Okanagan-Vernon stated: "This is a cheap shot on his part to say by freezing a certain amount of money that he's helping students, when in fact, in the long run, he's only helping them temporarily." It's scurrilous. These young people in our province need help when they go to school, and certainly you can't help them at all times, but at this particular time in their lives, a tuition fee freeze is tremendously important.

Our government investment in education is critical to providing opportunities for British Columbia's young people and to building a strong economy for this province. That's a commitment that our government does not take lightly. This year's funding increase for post-secondary education is almost $39 million. Of this $39 million, $17.5 million will fund 2,900 new student spaces at colleges and universities, and $13.4 million will go towards student financial assistance to reduce financial barriers to students. I'm very, very proud of that initiative. And I have to tell you that this weekend we were up in Campbell River talking to secondary students as

[ Page 7281 ]

well as to some college students, and they were exceptionally pleased with these initiatives -- just exceptionally pleased.

[3:45]

This year's funding allocations are part of an overall plan to increase opportunities for young British Columbians while building a strong provincial economy that is driven by an educated and skilled workforce. Since 1991 we have increased post-secondary education funding by $230 million. That's a 20 percent increase -- one that I'm very, very proud of and one that is the best record in this nation.

There was some discussion earlier this morning about young people and accessing traditional jobs over the course of the last 20 years, in the resource sector and that. There's no doubt that youth have to have opportunities to work in the summer -- in our food and beverage sector and hospitality and also in the resource sector -- but it's no secret that over the course of the 20 years, there have been many, many changes in our resource sector.

I'd like to make mention of the fact that 25,000 jobs in the forest sector were lost between 1975 and 1985, strictly because of technological change and the way that industry does business. It's not only in British Columbia, but in this global economy. Technologies are ever changing, particularly in the resource sector. It's interesting to walk through a sawmill that's now completely computerized. Where men and women used to make decisions on how to manufacture that log into a product, they now have high-tech computers making hundreds of thousands of decisions in a split second.

This is where industry is going in British Columbia, and this is why we have to have opportunities for our young people to get a good education and to have opportunities to get that technical background to work and compete in today's industries.

I was very pleased when the Minister of Advanced Education, Training and Technology announced, just today, an additional $2 million in funding to British Columbia's 20 colleges and institutes to upgrade and replace equipment used for information technology training. The member for Shuswap commented previously on that and on the importance of these initiatives and making them available to our youth. Access to advanced education and training is a priority for our government, and by investing $2 million in information technology equipment today, we are arming British Columbia students with the tools and knowledge for the high-tech workforce of tomorrow. And tomorrow's on us now.

At a software summit held last July, leaders in the B.C. technology industry identified a shortage of British Columbians trained in the technology field. It has been estimated that 12,000 positions for skilled software workers are going unfilled in Canada today as are as many as 1,500 software jobs in British Columbia. So this is good news -- our commitment to post-secondary education and to high-tech.

Our government's response has been to adopt some of the recommendations made by leaders in the technology industry by dedicating 500 of our 2,900 new post-secondary spaces to the high-tech area; by giving British Columbia colleges, universities and institutes an additional $26 million in funding for the 1998-1999 budget year, including $17.5 million for new student spaces; by freezing tuition fees for post-secondary students for a third year in a row; and by spending $123 million to link provincial public schools, colleges and institutions to the information highway -- also known as the provincial learning network.

That's an initiative that I am very, very proud of. Areas such as Port Hardy, Campbell River, Tahsis, Zeballos, Kyuquot -- all those areas -- are going to benefit tremendously by hooking up to the provincial learning network. What a great opportunity!

There was an interesting

article in the Vancouver Sun last week -- as a matter fact, a front-page

article -- saying that British Columbia has the best-educated people in this country -- indeed, in North America. I think we have some great opportunities. You can find people that were educated in British Columbia in various technologies and industries wherever you go in the world. People from British Columbia are indeed working on projects all over the world. I'm very proud of that, and that's a result of educational opportunities and our post-secondary education system.

It was only a short time ago that British Columbia had the second-highest tuition fees in this country, and today we have the second-lowest. That's an initiative that I am extremely proud of. I'm proud of our commitment to education; I'm proud of our commitment to working-class families. Our initiatives will ensure access to education for all British Columbians and afford them a place in today's economy and here in British Columbia.

Education has been called by many the great equalizer -- a great opportunity for people to be part of society and to have many great opportunities. Our government's policy -- and that's the difference between being opposition and being government . . . . As government, you have to have policies; you have to build on them; you have to work towards them. We've done that in education and health. Our many initiatives in education today are going to benefit our young people and afford them opportunities in this province. They'll be taking leadership roles in a few short years. I'm proud of that.

Our government's policy and commitment to education and opportunities for youth is unparalleled on this continent. I'm very, very proud of that -- building on these initiatives. I stand here today in support of Bill 8.

R. Coleman: I'm pleased to stand and speak with regards to this piece of legislation this afternoon. I think that the tuition freeze is a very small piece of a very complex puzzle, a puzzle that has to be dealt with from the standpoint of our young people in this country and in this province in particular. You have to ask yourself the question . . . . The funding that goes to our colleges and universities comes in proportioned in three ways: from government or from tuition fees or from private donations.

As we freeze tuition rates and as the costs of operation of the physical plant go up, those funds will have to come from somewhere else -- probably from the taxpayer. The relative issue here has got to be dealt with, as the member for Powell River-Sunshine Coast said earlier. Legitimate long-term financial planning for our institutions is important, and we have to put them on a system where this will work and look at how everything is affected. If you bring one action into a system, there's always a reaction somewhere else.

The tragedy in post-secondary education is that we are a country that in 1978-79 had a student loan attached to 1 percent of bankruptcies,

whereas today we live in a country where 30 percent of personal bankruptcies have student loans attached to them. We've gone from a level of student-loan debt . . . . Today a graduate out of university can be expected to be in debt from $25,000 to $30,000. It is projected that by 2005 to 2010 that number will be somewhere in the vicinity of $40,000 per student. I can't imagine somebody starting out with that much debt, trying to get on their feet and start their life, because of the cost of their education.

The unfortunate thing with that student debt level is that it is also projected that we will have around $2 billion in non-performing student loans by 2010 in this country. That is a public issue we have to deal with from a cost perspective as a province and also as a country.

[ Page 7282 ]

The issue is not just tuition but the total cost of education and how students can pay for it. The issue is that we have 19 percent unemployment for the youth of this province who are trying to get that education. They have no way of paying for it, because they have nowhere to go to work. The issue is that after they come out of school, the system that allows them to pay back their student loans is so onerous that they are unable to do so, and they can end up in personal bankruptcy before they're the age of 30. Can you imagine starting out your life that way, hon. Speaker?

It would be absolutely abhorrent to me to have to have done that as a young man. The price of a student loan that they come out with today is equivalent to what I paid to build my first home. That is something that I find inconceivable and something that we're going to have to address.

The budget for post-secondary education in this province will be $1.26 billion for the 1998-99 academic year. That's a lot of money, but with $31.4 billion in debt, we're spending $2.4 billion in interest. In other words, if we simply didn't have the debt, we could fund our post-secondary education system, dollar-for-dollar, 100 percent, from the interest on the debt for two years. That goes back to how we manage the money of government and how we manage the operation of government finances in this province.

In order to make the significant changes that we are going to have to make as a society and as a government, we are going to have to get our financial house in order. We can't live with seven consecutive deficit budgets that are going to have an impact on what we hold dear to us -- health care and education and social programs. We can't afford to take $2.4 billion out of our economy every year and just spend it in interest and then try to maintain the other programs to boot. It is vital to us that when we get that fiscal house in order, the money goes where it should.

If we got our debt and deficit under control, we would be able to put more money into post-secondary education, we would be able to put ourselves in a situation where we could reduce the debt of students graduating from universities, and we'd be able to put them on a solid footing for the future. That's going to be the key for post-secondary education in the future.

The sad thing about somebody trying to get through university today, with 19 percent unemployment and $30,000 or $40,000 in debt, is the struggle to try to get their feet on the ground and get ahead. We as a society have a responsibility. The government has a responsibility to not be the government of big announcements -- big announcements that call for jobs for youth when there are none; big announcements that say we're going to do things for student loans when we don't; big announcements that say we're going to freeze tuition, when in actual fact we're loading other costs onto the system.

We have to get down to the deliverables. The deliverables are that we need 20,000 people trained for high-tech jobs, and we aren't training fast enough in our universities today. The deliverables are that we have to expand our electronic portion of education so that we can educate more people by making maximum use of the physical plant. We have to attack the idea of having applied degrees and applied trades in advanced education so people have jobs when they come out of university and so they can pay back their students loans and get themselves on their feet.

It is absolutely important that we look for long-term financial planning and proper and maximum use of the physical plant of our universities. Then we go on from there to balance our budgets and get our fiscal house in order so that we can help the students of this province in the future.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

Even though the tuition freeze is a good thing, it is one piece of a very big puzzle. It's very important that we recognize that we want to reduce our interest costs, that we want to be able to deliver the cost of education at a level where our students are not coming out so deeply in debt, that we do not want to face a financial crisis of $2 billion in non-performing student loans in the year 2010, and that we do not want to put our young people into bankruptcy before the age of 30. Those have to be the priorities, in addition to this particular bill.

I. Chong: I rise today, as well, to speak to second reading of Bill 8, the Tuition Fee Freeze Act. Members on this side of the House have already made some very valid points regarding this particular act. I would like to be able to speak on this, particularly because there is a university in my riding. I will begin my comments by first stating that education is certainly an investment for all of us -- whether directly or indirectly -- because education provides a positive impact on the economy of British Columbia.

These past few years have seen universities and colleges struggling with their operating budgets. That has been as a result of a decline in government funding and the imposition of tuition fee freezes. What governments must recognize is that these institutions' budgets are not unlike those of government. In government budgets, the bulk of their expenditures are represented by salaries, and that, too, is the case for institutions. When government funding declines, these educational institutions must find ways to compensate. A common or typical consequence that has occurred has been downsizing of staff.

But what has that done to the quality of the education provided to our students? Are services being reduced or eliminated? If so, have those been an impact on the students' future prospects for job opportunities? These are questions for which answers must be found before governments embark on their initiatives.

[4:00]

When senior staff in these post-secondary institutions retire due to downsizing attempts, there is a significant loss in terms of experience and expertise that may lead to a loss in efficiencies in the running of these organizations. We have all heard that in a reorganization there is a certain amount of stress put on those remaining staff and that they must carry additional workloads as a result. Will those pressures on remaining staff inadvertently reduce access to courses by diminishing options for those students? That, again, remains a question that requires an answer.

By reducing government funding and imposing tuition fee freezes, has the government considered outcomes and outputs? Also, has the government considered the benefits and/or the costs associated with those measures? It concerns me that this issue has not been addressed by government. That is not to say that a tuition fee freeze is not supportable, but like all initiatives and all public policy decisions, it is incumbent on the government to take into consideration what it is that they hope to achieve and that these measures are not introduced solely for political purposes.

[ Page 7283 ]

take courses that you want in a particular year. If students must defer courses because institutions cannot provide them due to their fiscal restraints, then it becomes more costly for the student overall, because the extra cost of an additional semester or an additional year will be far greater than any tuition fee freeze saving that the student is supposedly going to enjoy.

As I stated earlier, we must consider the impacts of this initiative. In 1996, two years ago, I spent some time with a number of students who expressed to me their concerns about the tuition fee freeze when it was first introduced. These students were astute enough to recognize that a tuition fee freeze was going to burden the post-secondary education system with other problems and that those students who were just enrolling two years ago, in 1996, would likely face a substantial increase some four or five years later, when they would be at a most critical stage in their course of studies. It would be at a time when they could not afford to not proceed with their education studies.

So the students that I spoke with were very concerned that universities and colleges, in an attempt to balance their budgets, would not be able to attract the very best professors and teachers that they would ultimately depend upon. What they were concerned about was that by not attracting the very best teaching professionals, it could lead to a downgrade -- not a downgrade in the credit downgrade sense, but a downgrade that nonetheless could affect future enrolments.

I believe that we are all in agreement when we state that our society does indeed benefit from an educated populace. For that reason, governments must be supportive of post-secondary institutions. But at the same time, there are increasing demands on all sectors of our society. It comes as no surprise that taxpayers are looking at us, as elected officials, to put in place measurable returns for the public's investment in higher education.

How do we evaluate those measurables? Well, since those enrolled in higher education are there because they are hoping to obtain employment or obtain better-paying employment, we should be able to measure that. The most obvious would be to start with measuring youth employment and youth employability. We have learned that under the NDP, youth unemployment has risen from 15.3 percent in 1991 to 17.8 in 1998. What that translates into is that there are 18,000 fewer youths today who have a job than in 1991.

Let us look at another fact: the number of bankruptcies declared by B.C. students rose from 690 in 1996 to 1,159 in 1997. Those are alarming statistics, and if these tuition fee freezes were meant to reverse those numbers, then this government initiative has failed.

In conclusion, while a tuition fee freeze is supportable in principle, there are many other issues that must be considered if we are to advance the youth of today into becoming our leaders of tomorrow. With that comment, I take my seat.

J. Dalton: I seek leave to make an introduction, hon. Speaker.

Leave granted.

J. Dalton: On behalf of my colleague from West Vancouver-Garibaldi, I would like to welcome to the House 27 grade 4 and 5 students from Myrtle Phillip Community School in the beautiful community of Whistler, accompanied by several adults and their teacher, Mr. Gerhard Reimer. Please welcome them all.

The Speaker: Seeing no further speakers, I recognize the Minister of Advanced Education to close debate.

Hon. A. Petter: There is nothing quite so depressing in this House as watching the members opposite trying to run from their own dismal record in education. I guess that's what you have to do when your record is as dismal as the Liberal Party's has been. But it's kind of sad that rather than use this debate as an opportunity to recant some of their prior positions, they instead use it as an opportunity to weave and bob and try to avoid the real issues.

The fact is that most British Columbians know what the party opposite would do if it had the chance, which thankfully it hasn't had. They would increase tuition fees, as other parties of the same thought pattern have done in other provinces -- provinces they constantly refer to in glowing terms, like Alberta, which has tuition fees more than $1,000 higher per year than this province. A member opposite referred to Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan and B.C. are the only two provinces that have had per-capita spending growth in post-secondary education. We know that the members opposite would not follow that pattern.

They would follow the pattern of other provinces, which have seen reductions in per-capita spending growth in education. Of course, we know that the party opposite has encouraged the federal government in the past to continue to make cuts in this area.

What's most depressing of all, hon. Speaker, is that they seem to miss the basic point. This is about people. This is about families. This is about kids; this is about their future. This is about a time in which having access to post-secondary education is as basic to those kids and their future as having a high school education was some 20 or so years ago. I would suggest to members opposite that they spend some time reflecting on that.

Rather than picking apart and talking about barriers and worrying about whether the barriers should be higher or lower or about ancillary fees or not ancillary fees, they should be working with the government to work out how we further reduce the barriers. Let's follow some of the other countries that don't share this very regressive view that we should be increasing barriers to education for students, and let's talk about how we reduce those barriers. How do we reduce barriers in this province for adult basic education?

How do we reduce barriers in this province for kids for whom even the existing tuition fees are too high? That's the project this party is working on. That's the project this government is working on, not some nitpicking, run-from-the-record kind of debate we've heard opposite.

Just to give you a sense, hon. Speaker, of how nitpicking and contradictory it is, last year in debate, when the legislation didn't specify ancillary fees and some institutions moved to increase such fees, what did the members opposite say? They complained that while tuition fees were frozen, everything else would go up. We had quotes like, "Application fees, transcript fees, technology fees are all going up," from the member opposite who is now the Education critic. The Opposition House Leader said: "Now, through the back door, the government is hitting them with technology fees and application fees and transcript fees."

So what do we do? We make sure that concern is well provided for in this legislation by saying that where institutions . . . .

Interjections.

Hon. A. Petter: Listen up, members. I know it's hard to have your words repeated back to you, because they're

[ Page 7284 ]

always so contradictory day to day and week to week, let alone year to year. You had your words quoted back to you.

What we did was we shared that concern. We don't want institutions to end-run this intent by trying to use those fees to increase tuition, and we covered it off. Now they stand up -- and I can't wait to get the Blues -- and start complaining: "Oh, my God, now you're trying to stop the institutions from increasing the very fees that last year we were complaining were going up." So what can you do with this group, hon. Speaker, other than ignore them? What can you do?

This government has a positive project for the future. It's about education. We have, in the last six years, moved to being the most educated province in the country. We're not going to let that success record slip by us. We are a province that, along with Saskatchewan, has increased post-secondary funding per capita, and we've increased it more than Saskatchewan. We are number one in the country. We're not going to let that record slip with obfuscation and criticism from the members opposite.

Yes, we've created over 13,000 new spaces for students over the last three years, and we're proud of it. And yes, we're increasing resources for students in this year's budget, and we're proud of that as well. But that doesn't mean that you can't also protect students from increased tuition fees. In fact, as I said earlier, we should be going in the opposite direction. We should be finding ways to further remove those barriers. That's what this project should be. It's depressing to hear the members opposite squirm and worm and try to avoid the basic issue.

[4:15]

The fact is that there are two visions in this House. When we get to division, it will appear that there is only one, but there are two visions in this House in reality. One vision says that we as a society and as a government have a responsibility to act to give the tools to all students, regardless of income, to make sure that they have those skills. Another vision basically says that education is some kind of privilege you have to buy your way into.

The members opposite will stand up when the time comes and pretend that is not their view, but we all know and the people of British Columbia know that it is precisely their view. That is why this government has brought in this legislation, and that's why it's important that there be legislation to set the benchmark against which that group will be measured in the years ahead.

Second reading of Bill 8 approved on the following division:

YEAS -- 68

Evans

Zirnhelt

McGregor

Kwan

Hammell

Boone

Streifel

Pullinger

Lali

Orcherton

Stevenson

Calendino

Goodacre

Walsh

Randall

Gillespie

Robertson

Cashore

Conroy

Priddy

Petter

Miller

G. Clark

Dosanjh

MacPhail

Lovick

Ramsey

Farnworth

Waddell

Hartley

Sihota

Smallwood

Sawicki

Bowbrick

Kasper

Doyle

Giesbrecht

Janssen

Sanders

Gingell

C. Clark

Campbell

Farrell-Collins

de Jong

Plant

Abbott

Neufeld

Chong

Whittred

Jarvis

Anderson

Nettleton

Penner

Weisbeck

Hogg

Hawkins

Coleman

Stephens

Hansen

Thorpe

Symons

van Dongen

Barisoff

Dalton

Masi

Kreuger

McKinnon

J. Wilson

NAYS -- 1

G. Wilson

Bill 8, Tuition Fee Freeze Act, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. J. MacPhail: I call second reading of Bill 9.

FINANCE AND CORPORATE RELATIONS

STATUTES AMENDMENT ACT, 1998

(second reading)

Hon. J. MacPhail: Hon. Speaker, I move that the bill now be read a second time.

The Finance and Corporate Relations Statutes Amendment Act amends the Mortgage Brokers Act, the Real Estate Act and the Securities Act to enhance public protection and to strengthen regulation in the key areas.

The amendments to the Mortgage Brokers Act respond to growth and increased complexity in the mortgage market in recent years. To help protect those who invest in mortgages, this bill requires that information needed by investors to make informed investor decisions be disclosed prior to an investment in a mortgage. Investors are also protected by mandatory administration agreements that clearly set out the responsibilities of the mortgage administrator and the investors.

In addition, the bill requires mandatory disclosure of actual and potential conflicts of interest to both borrowers and investors and further protects borrowers by clarifying that borrowers are entitled to a reasonable amount of time to understand a mortgage before completing a mortgage transaction.

This bill also provides for more efficient and effective regulation of the mortgage market by allowing differing classes of mortgage broker registration. In addition, regulators are provided with a strengthened regulatory tool, such as a power to impose an administrative penalty of up to $50,000, and modernized offence provisions. The amendments to the Mortgage Brokers Act form a cornerstone for a modernized approach to the regulation of the mortgage brokerage industry by ensuring that consumers in the mortgage market, be they borrowers or investors, are protected by the mandatory disclosure of information necessary to their borrowing or investment decisions.

We consulted very widely with key interests in the mortgage brokerage industry and with the regulators on the amendments to the Mortgage Brokers Act before they were finalized for introduction. The amendments in this bill reflect the benefits of this consultation.

The bill also amends the Real Estate Act to provide for an industry-funded special compensation fund. Real estate is the largest investment that a typical British Columbian will make in his or her lifetime. The amendments to the Real Estate Act before us today will protect those investing in real estate against fraud or the wrongful conversion of trust moneys held by a real estate licensee in the course of a real estate transac-

[ Page 7285 ]

tion. The growth of the real estate market has resulted in significantly larger deposits being placed in trust with real estate licensees. The current form of protection, bonding, is inefficient and bears no relation to the size of the deposit in the trust to be protected. These amendments address these concerns by replacing bonding with an industry-funded compensation fund to reimburse members of the public for losses incurred due to fraud or other illegal activity by a real estate licensee. This program also complements the industry-run errors and omissions liability insurance program for losses due to the negligence of a licensee.

The bill also contains a minor amendment to the Real Estate Act to allow the Real Estate Council of British Columbia to collect the reasonable costs of a disciplinary hearing from a licensee where the hearing results in a finding of misconduct on the part of the licensee. This amendment would allocate some of the costs of policing the industry to those licensees who violate the provisions of the Real Estate Act and is consistent with the practice of other self-regulatory bodies in the province.

The bill, finally, also amends the Securities Act in three ways. First, it provides for more timely reporting of insider trades. This will ensure that this important information is in the hands of investors more quickly. This amendment will also bring the timing requirements for reporting an insider trade into line with the timing in other Canadian jurisdictions. In addition, the amendment will provide flexibility so that the reporting time could be shortened further. Second, it amends the takeover bid provisions in the act to maintain uniformity with other jurisdictions.

The proposed amendments are part of a package of legislative and rule amendments that would extend the minimum time period for responding to a takeover bid. This would give a target company's directors more time to react and consider alternatives and give investors more time to consider the bid. The amendments would also allow takeover bids to be commenced by advertisement in financial newspapers.

Third, the proposed amendments will clarify that segregated funds are subject to the Securities Act. Segregated funds are similar to mutual funds but are sold by insurers. While not imposing additional regulation, the amendments will ensure that these products are subject to the general prohibitions on fraud and misrepresentation.

This bill provides greater protection for investors in the mortgage market and the securities market and for trust moneys under the Real Estate Act. Improved investor protection and the reduction of the regulatory burden will result in more efficient and effective regulation and will ultimately contribute to the growth of the financial services sector in the province.

G. Farrell-Collins: First of all, I want to comment that my understanding is that the government has consulted not just recently but over a number of years with regard to the legislation that's before us, particularly with mortgage brokers, etc. I know that various groups have been involved in those consultations, and I know that they've put their concerns forward to the government. I hope that everything in the bill works out to be just fine.

I'm a little concerned with the time frame. This bill was introduced Thursday, and it's up for second reading today. My understanding is that the intention is to move to committee stage as early as Thursday. Despite the fact that these various organizations had the opportunity to be involved in the early stages of the bill development, they too received the bill only last week. They require some time to look at it and to determine how well it reflects or how much it diverges from the discussions that took place with the government over a period of time.

I'll just reiterate comments I've made other times in this House about the advisability of allowing time for people to have a chance to digest legislation that affects them. Perhaps on some occasions -- though not necessarily with a bill like this -- those consultations could be done through committees and public hearings. Perhaps a lot of the advance work has been done on this, but certainly it's important that we give those various people who are impacted by the legislation time to digest it, time to reflect on it and time to offer suggestions.

There have been a number of times in the Legislature while I've been here when legislation has been introduced and passed in a much longer period of time than we intend to take on this piece of legislation -- only to find after the fact that there are some major concerns with the legislation. They aren't partisan; they're just administrative, where individuals find that they can't work with what's there. Often what happens is that the government ends up not proclaiming certain sections of legislation or, in some cases, not proclaiming the entire bill until we come back the following year and correct those problems, those omissions or those errors.

[4:30]

I think it's advisable to move slowly on some legislation, particularly legislation that has the potential to make a great impact. I hope that in the future that's what can be done. At this point, I think the bill is moving in the right direction, from what I've seen so far and in the consultations I've had with the various parties affected. In the meantime we will certainly, between now and Thursday, be looking more at the various sections to see if there are any errors or omissions, and we will raise those at the time. But for now, we offer our support in second reading.

Hon. J. MacPhail: I move that the bill be referred to Committee of the Whole for consideration at the next sitting after today.

Motion approved.

Bill 9, Finance and Corporate Relations Statutes Amendment Act, 1998, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. J. MacPhail: I call second reading of Bill 12.

MINING RIGHTS AMENDMENT ACT, 1998

(second reading)

Hon. D. Miller: I rise to move second reading of Bill 12. Bill 12 is necessary to introduce new mining initiatives to attract investment and create jobs in the sector by demonstrating government's commitment to the industry. The act is intended to assure access to lands for exploration, ensure that appropriate compensation is paid for mineral tenures expropriated in order to create parks, and enable the development of regulations to govern Mines Act permitting processes, including time lines.

The mining sector is a significant player in the British Columbia economy, as I indicated in my remarks in my introduction. If you look at all-in job numbers -- smelting and the

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whole thing -- it's in the 60,000 range. Those jobs are obviously very good, well-paying jobs, family-supporting jobs, and through the vehicle of this bill and other initiatives, we want to encourage even more job creation in this sector.

What's necessary is to ensure investor confidence, and we will continue to work with industry to meets its goal -- its own defined goal -- of creating 22,000 new mining-related jobs over the next ten years. That number, interestingly enough, will be achieved only if we move into copper smelting in British Columbia. But that's fine. That's a good challenge to accept.

The Mining Rights Amendment Act addresses requirements outlined in the industry's Mining Jobs 2000 initiative, including industry's requirement for access to land, security of title and an efficient and transparent permitting process. Land use plans may propose specific objectives and strategies to guide the conditions for access development and management. They cannot, however, prohibit appropriate access to mineral claims.

This position is consistent with government's clearly stated previous direction and intent at the land use planning tables. Even though the province's environmental review process is one of the most rigorous in the world, we do continue to attract investment in high-quality mining projects that meet our standards. We've had some recent announcements of projects that have gone through the EA process -- Tulsequah Chief, Willow Creek. We have a couple of mines that have recently opened in the last six months to a year. They're facing some hurdles on the marketplace side, but people nonetheless had the confidence to make that kind of significant investment in our province.

Significant parts of the act. Our mineral tenure holder will be issued a special use permit by the Ministry of Forests for appropriate ground-based access to his or her tenure, if the tenure holder also holds a permit under the Mines Act for mining activities and meets other prescribed conditions.

Compensation for expropriated mineral titles through the amendment of the Mineral Tenure Act, the Park Act and the Expropriation Act requires that the tenure holders are compensated when their tenures are expropriated for the creation of new parks. The permitting process

section permits the creation of regulations to govern the permitting processes for mining activities under the Mines Act, including the establishment of time lines.

In closing, I hope that all members will support passage of this important bill. With that, I move second reading of Bill 12.

D. Jarvis: I rise to speak on the second reading of Bill 12. It certainly captures the spirit of the mining community -- and myself as well. After many, many years, it's like a long, long winter, and then the first bird starts to chirp. This government has suddenly realized that there are problems